bio

Mycorrhiza

The intimate symbiosis between plant roots and soil fungi - the name is Greek for "fungus-root." The plant supplies carbon (sugars made by photosynthesis); the fungus repays it with phosphorus, nitrogen, and water drawn from a volume of soil no root could ever reach. Some 80-90% of land plant species form this partnership, and it has existed since the first plants colonised land roughly 400 million years ago.